Mikey Musumeci is proving to be a good sport in and out of competition.
The ONE flyweight submission grappling world champion was recently on the receiving end of some light-hearted online banter from his upcoming opponent Jarred Brooks, whom he defends his world title against in the co-main event of “ONE Fight Night 13: Allazov vs. Grigorian” this Friday, August 4.
The typically outspoken strawweight mixed martial arts king recently shared a parody of Musumeci on Instagram with the tagline, “To beat Mikey Musumeci, you have to become Mikey Musumeci”.
https://www.instagram.com/p/reel:Cu7P_RTLZGI
But it’s all in good fun for the Brazilian jiu-jitsu ace ahead of the pair’s high-stakes encounter at the Lumpinee Boxing Stadium in Bangkok, Thailand.
“He’s not an a–hole. He’s a good dude. You know? I like humor like this. This is like in the gym when all your friends are messing around with each other,” Musumeci said, in reaction to the video.
“All my friends, we f-ck around all the time. Making fun of each other. Joking – like it’s that vibe. It isn’t like a, like, a disrespectful … anyway. He’s such a nice guy. He’s a world champion, and I respect him so much, you know? And I think that this is an awesome match. It’s going to be a lot of fun.”
The American star maintains a deep connection with his Italian roots and is known for his love of the cuisine from his family’s homeland. He famously fasts throughout his punishing 12-hour daily training regimen, then feasts on homemade pizza and pasta at night.
As such, the one element of Brooks’ parody that Musumeci took some offense to was the quality of the pasta dish that “The Monkey God” slurps at the end of the clip.
The mild-mannered submission grappling king plans to handle that situation in the way anyone familiar with him would expect – with extreme kindness.
“I have a gift for him. I got this high-level pasta from Italy to give him at weigh-ins after he posted that video making fun of me,” Musumeci said.
“His pasta was whack in that video, so I got him some nice pasta to give to his family. So, we’re going to fix that part of the video.”
ONE Fight Night 13 will be broadcast live and free on Prime Video for fans across North America with an Amazon subscription.
